Wilhelm Eduard von Spee

Wilhelm Eduard von Spee (23 March 1851-8 October 1927) was an admiral of the German Empire Kriegsmarine. 63 years old at the outbreak of World War I, Spee was inexperienced and was captured in the Battle off Sumatra in February 1915.

Biography
Spee was born in Kolinsdorf in Silesia, and attended the University of Magdeburg in Brandenburg, a province of the Prussian kingdom of the German Empire. He was not related to Admiral Maximilian von Spee of Falkland Islands fame during World War I. Spee became an Admiral of the Kriegsmarine, the German navy, after extensive training. He had no certain skills and was untested and old at the start of World War I in 1914, already 63 years old.

Sent to Kaiser-Wilhelmsland to command the German Navy in the Pacific Ocean, Spee fought against the Royal Navy sporadically until February 1915, when he blockaded trade routes near Sumatra. The British defeated him in the Battle off Sumatra, and he was captured aboard his capital ship. He was held as a prisoner in Australia until the Treaty of Versailles in February 1919, and he was released. He died in Breslau, Silesia, at the age of 76 in 1927.